Gunpowder

Low Wood Clocktower

(Page created 19/04/05. Last updated 22/02/17)

compiled by Roger Baker from the publications listed below

The manufacture of gunpowder in Cumbria developed initially in response to demand from the mining and quarrying industries of the region, making use of the natural resources of woodland and water power available in Furness and South Lakeland.

Gunpowder is a mixture of saltpetre, charcoal and sulphur, usually in the proportion of 75:15:10, although these varied according to the purpose for which a particular type of powder was intended. The saltpetre, or potassium nitrate, supplies oxygen, and the other constituents provide fuel, the sulphur serving to inflame at a relatively low temperature.

Saltpetre was imported from India, Chile and Germany, sulphur from Italy and Sicily, originally through the local ports of Milnthorpe or Greenodd. Charcoal was made from local woodlands initially, using juniper, silver birch and alder. The old method of charcoal burning (or rather roasting) however did not result in a clean enough product for gunpowder, and so the charcoal was burnt in retorts of a kind invented by a well-known Lakeland resident, Bishop Watson, in the eighteenth century.

The general production process involved refining the saltpetre and sulphur, which then along with the charcoal were pulverised, weighed, mixed and then incorporated by grinding and crushing them into a mixture known as mill cake. This was then broken down, pressed into hard slate-like sheets of press cake, corned into grains, dusted, glazed and finally dried. This process, with particular reference to the Elterwater site, is described in detail in “The Industrial History of the Lake Counties”. The availability of water power throughout the site was crucial, although Black Beck was worked by steam engines.

There were 7 works operating at times during the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, from the opening of Old Sedgwick in 1764 to the closure of Gatebeck in 1937. They were:

Old Sedgwick

SD 509972

south of Kendal

1764 – 1853

Basingill

SD 508868

near Sedgwick

1790 – 1935

Low Wood

SD 348837

near Haverthwaite

1798 – 1935

Elterwater

NY 327052

Langdale

1824 –

Gatebeck

SD 544855

south-east of Kendal

1852 – 1937

New Sedgwick

SD 508878

south of Kendal

1857 – 1935

Black Beck

SD 337859

near Bouth

1860 – 1928

Each of these works, with the exception of Elterwater, was eventually controlled by W.H.Wakefield and Co..

The range of powders made was a wide one, ranging from “Extra Large Coarse Black” through successive stages of fineness to “Extra Fine”. Quarries and iron mines used coarse powders, which were slow burning and did not shatter rock into small fragments, whereas the finer powders were used for sporting and military purposes. The works themselves tended to specialise, so that Blackbeck made fast explosive powders, Elterwater mainly slow blasting cartridges, and Sedgwick faster mining cartridges.

Early transport from the sites made use of water. Powder from Low Wood for example went down the Leven estuary on barges to Greenodd for transhipment into sailing vessels. The railways into the area changed all that, although not always conveniently situated. The Gatebeck proprietors installed a three and a half mile horse-drawn tramway that followed Peasey Beck and a roadside to reach the station at Milnthorpe.

The gunpowder industry in Cumbria supplied in time the whole country with the bulk of its black blasting powder until demand reduced with the arrival of new products such as dynamite and gelatine. Although there is a continuing demand for gunpowder from the quarrying industry and for other uses, the product is now imported from outside the UK.